Just Give Us A Chance
by Ultrawoman
Summary: Part of the ‘Just Us’ Series. AU 6.19 Seeing Red. A rewrite of the bathroom scene, that in my opinion took both Buffy and Spike so OOC on the show. Here's my attempt to make it end more happily... and Spuffily... but still realistically.


A/N : Here's an episode that drastically needed fixing Spuffy-wise! It was OOC enough in my opinion for Anya and Spike to get it on in Entropy, but Spike forcing himself on Buffy, and her doing the weak little girl act didn't work for me on any level at all. Seeing Red is one ep I just cannot bear to watch most of the time. Anywho, here's how I re-wrote the dreaded bathroom scene into something a little nicer and Spuffier - hope you all approve.  
_Disclaimer : Joss owns all recognisable characters in Buffy The Vampire Slayer. The episode Seeing Red was written by Steven DeKnight and any recognisable dialogue here belongs to them._

Just Give Us A Chance

"You should have let Xander kill me" Spike says bitterly as he stands across the bathroom from Buffy. She didn't want to have this conversation now, if at all, but it doesn't seem like she's getting much of a choice in the matter.

"I couldn't" she admits, glancing away.

"Because you love me" Spike replies, not letting it sound like a question, wanting to just believe it's true, though deep down he has his doubts still.

"No, I don't" Buffy shakes her head tiredly, so bored of this same thing all the time.

"Why do you keep lying to yourself?" Spike asks her frustratedly as she reaches to turn the faucet on the bath and gives up when it hurts.

"I'm not saying I don't have feelings for you" she admits as she looks over at him, "I do, but it's not love. I could never trust you enough for it to become that" she says, knowing she's hurting him and not really wanting to, but also knowing she has no choice. This can't happen, her and Spike, it's just wrong.

"That's a lie and you know it" Spike snaps as he steps a little closer to her, trying to see her face when she looks at the floor, "Gotta trust a person to do the things we did, Slayer" he tells her as he stands right in front of her now and reaches out, his hands on her upper arms "I know you feel like I do" he says, looking into her eyes, "You don't have to hide it anymore"

"Spike..." Buffy struggles a little when his grip tightens too much and he gets incredibly close, invading her personal space on a level she's very uncomfortable with.

"Let yourself feel it" he begs of her, moving in to kiss her, one hand sliding down her arm. Buffy doesn't know where it's going to and she doesn't want to find out, she doesn't want any of this.

"Stop it" she says, really having to struggle against him and still unable to get free, "Spike, think about what you're doing" she yells, "If you love me like you say, then let go of me, please" she urges and he does as she asks, their eyes meeting at last.

"I'm sorry" he says with sincerity, taking a step back, and glancing down at the hands that had held her, then over at Buffy herself as she pulls her robe tighter around her and backs up til her legs hit the tub. She's afraid.

"Buffy, you didn't really think I..." Spike can't even finish the sentence. To consider she might've thought him capable of forcing himself upon her, it made him feel sick, but then he had continued on when she'd told him to stop... but didn't she always do that?

"I don't know" Buffy shifts awkwardly, she never wanted to accuse Spike of such a thing, and she can see even now why her initial protest had not been enough to make him stop. It was their game in a way, she said no and he convinced her. She just felt vulnerable tonight with her back and everything, she supposed.

"I can't deal with this right now" she sighs, "Please, just go"

"I'm sorry, luv" Spike repeats, making sure she really understands that he means it sincerely, "Really, I was desperate but I would never... bloody hell, is that really what you think of me?" he asks, running a hand back through his hair and frowning hard. If she still thought he was this bad, could there ever be a chance of a happy ending? He thought they'd moved past the time when she feared for her life in his company.

"No, I don't think that" Buffy tells him, realising how true it is as she says it, "Spike, what we have, whatever is or was between us, it can't be love" she explains, careful of how much of a crumb of hope she might be giving him.

"Why not?" Spike sighs, never really understanding why Buffy won't let herself love him, "Because I'm a vampire?" he asks incredulously, head titled, "Sorry, pet but that excuse lost cred as soon as you and Angelus bumped uglies" he spits out his grand-sire's name and Buffy's eyes harden, though they both seem to have forgotten that she asked him to leave a moment before.

"You're not him" she says coldly and Spike almost laughs.

"Oh, so you can see that? Well hallelujah, Slayer" he says, clapping his hands together, "Me and Angel aren't the same person, you just said that, you know it and you believe it, so why in God's name do you keep punishing me for what that git did to you!" he half-yells as hurt and frustration turn to anger inside him and wish to be released.

"Why do you think this is about you? Or Angel? Or any guy in my life?" Buffy yells back, her own frustration and therefore anger mounting, "Maybe it's just about me. Maybe I just can't handle the fact that..." she pauses as he stares at her then finally finishes her rant, "...that I hurt everybody I get close to, that they wind up dead or in pain or suddenly evil! You wanna know why I really believed you had those cameras on me before, Spike?" she asks, not really requiring an answer before she tells him anyway, "Because there had to be something. I had to have driven you to do something bad, after the way I treated you, you couldn't still be this nice to me, I... I don't deserve it" she falters again and swallows hard, desperate not to cry. She's already shown him too much of the deep feeling that rushes around inside her, and there's no taking any of it back.

"Slayer, where the bloody hell is all this coming from?" he asks her with surprising gentleness suddenly, "Why didn't you tell me any of this before?"

"And say what?" Buffy sighs, trying to wipe stray tears from her face without him noticing but it's impossible, "Gee Spike, great sex, hey can you let me know when you plan on going evil?" she snaps, sarcasm dripping from every word.

The silence nearly suffocates both of them, but there are too many thoughts, one too many revelations to make sense of before either of them have words to say.

"'S why you kept beatin' on me, tellin' me I was scum, right?" Spike says suddenly, as all the pieces drop into place, "If you didn't let me close enough, wouldn't hurt if I went all Angelus-like on you, or up and left all of a sudden like your Solider Boy?" he asks, though it's barely a question. He's just realised the point he'd been missing about Buffy Summers, and here he was thinking he knew her so well.

"Yes, no, maybe..." Buffy can't seem to find an answer to what he's saying, maybe because he's just got it more right than she would've liked, "It doesn't mean I love you" she clarifies, making sure that part is still perfectly clear, though it's a lot more fuzzy than it might be in her own head and heart right now.

"Reckon it might, pet" Spike counters, quick to get the rest of the sentence out before she can smack him in the head or even verbally argue, "and even if it doesn't mean love, it proves you care whether I'm dead or alive. That's more than you might've said before"

Buffy feels wretched as she looks at the tiled floor. Her back is killing her, the muscles screaming from her standing too long. The weight of her calling and her destiny begin to feel like a lead weight on her head again, as they often do lately. And still Spike stands there loving her, despite the terrible way she's treated him for too long.

"Why is it like this?" she asks in a small voice, "Why is it so complicated? Why did I do this to us?" she wants to know, as she looks up at Spike with fresh tears in her eyes, "Before, we were okay, we could talk and everything" she sniffs, "I miss the talking, I miss being able to know that when you look at me it's because you just love me so much..." her voice wavers as he looks at her just the way she described, so that she can almost see the deep feelings of love pouring out of his eyes for her, even after all that's happened. She feels unworthy of it, and yet she wouldn't give it up, not for the world.

"I know I'm selfish" she sniffs again trying it wipe away further tears, "I know I shouldn't expect you to love me when I can't even say it back but it was all that I had for a while. The only thing that meant anything real was that you loved me"

"I still do, pet" Spike tells her, reaching out as if to touch her, but pulling his arm back fast when he remembers what almost happened before, "Thought that was bleedin' obvious" he says frustratedly, wishing she could just understand because he has no other way left to prove it.

"What we did wasn't about love, Spike" Buffy shakes her head "It doesn't matter what you feel for me or what I might feel for you. Love isn't like that, violent and gross and..."

"It'd be easier, wouldn't it?" he interrupts, "If you could say the passion took away from the emotion, but it doesn't, Buffy" he tells her "You know it. 'S why you could never look me in the eye when we were together, cos you knew what you'd find there"

She physically turns away from him knowing it's true and hating it that he made her see.

"I love you" he continues, "wanted to tell you over and over every time it happened but I knew if I did you'd be out that door and maybe never come back. So I tried showing you how I felt. Didn't work though, you always wanted it rougher than that. Guess now I see why, better to keep me at arms length right? To not care?"

"Only it didn't work" she admits as she turns back and looks at him, "I do care, I have feelings for you and maybe they're not love but..." she pauses, considering what she's saying, but too much has already been let out to bother holding the rest in, "When I saw you with Anya, God it hurt so much" she admits, "I couldn't breathe, I felt sick, I... I thought I'd done it again, driven another one back to evil"

"That wasn't about being evil, luv" Spike promises, hating the fact he did that one stupid thing, "I told you what it was, and it meant nothing, less than nothing" he swears, tentatively reaching for her hand and glad when she lets him hold onto her fingers without argument, "Buffy we were hurting, me and her, we found some comfort, solace, whatever, but that wasn't love, and it wasn't an attempt to make you jealous or hurt you, pet. I would never deliberately hurt you" he tells her, echoing earlier words that she'd assured him she believed, "I thought you understood that"

"Part of me does" Buffy nods, looking down at her fingers entwined with his, "There's this little piece of me that... that maybe loves you" she admits, "that just wants me to let go and be with you and be happy but something keeps stopping me" she grips his hand tighter and makes sure he's properly listening when she continues, "I so want to trust you enough, Spike" she says sincerely as their eyes meet, "I so wish it could work out between us, but it can't"

"It can, Buffy" he tells her, stepping in closer, his other hand going to her shoulder, "Give me a chance to prove it to you, please?" he begs, wishing he could hold her, or kiss her, or something, but he has to get it right this time, has to take it slow if this is ever going to work out.

"I can't" Buffy shakes her head, voice wavering as more tears come, "I can't do that anymore Spike, it's just wrong"

"I didn't mean that" he frowns, as he realises what this year has really done to her. Though she started their twisted relationship, she's come to regard him as nothing more than the guy she has the sex with, he's not even her friend right now.

"We'll start over" he says hopefully, "We'll talk more, like we used to. I'll take you out someplace nice, buy you dinner. Anything you want Slayer, but please don't shut me out of your life just because you're scared" he begs her, "We've both done wrong, we know it, but if we're gonna be grow-ups about this then we can put it all behind us and move on"

Buffy is so torn when she looks up at him through misty eyes, wondering if she's seeing correctly or if she's imagining the tears in Spike's eyes too. She does care for him, and she feels like she could love him, even though she knows her friends won't approve and her calling forbids it. Her friends hadn't consulted her when they dragged her out of heaven, and when had her destiny and her Slayerness ever really enhanced her life? For once, Buffy thinks, she really wants to do something for herself, and as scary as it is to realise she's agreeing to a serious relationship with Spike, she finds herself doing just that.

"Okay" she nods once and he looks bemused.

"Okay, what now, luv?" he checks, determined not to screw up this time.

"Okay, we'll see how it goes" she says softly, "I... I need to take my bath, so maybe you want to go downstairs and make some coffee or something. When I'm done here I'll come down and we can talk" she suggests.

"Right then" Spike nods similarly and drops his hand from her shoulder, unable to stop a small smile from curving his lips.

What he has now, what he sees in her eyes as she looks at him, this is the crumb he'd been looking for more than a year ago. This is more real than anything they've done together since she's been back. His other hand almost slides from hers but she keeps tight hold of his fingers even when he moves towards the door. He glances back and she smiles at him.

"I won't be too long" she tells him, looking into his eyes, and he wonders vaguely if she means it as simply she won't take long in the tub, or if she means something else, something deeper, maybe that it won't be such a great amount of time before she can love him like he loves her. He doesn't dwell on it, just squeezes her hand one final time and then let's go, disappearing out of the bathroom door.

Buffy sighs as she finds herself alone in the room once again. She hadn't expected any of that to happen, she says to herself, as she turns on the faucet and fills the tub with warm water.

A bath will help her back, but talking with Spike will cure everything else. She knows it, and she can't wait to get downstairs and find him. She's denied their feelings too long now, it's time to give their love a chance.

The End


End file.
